Motorola slashes jobs

Troubled mobile phone outfit Motorola is to cut 800 jobs in the wake of its poor summer results. The company didn't say which divisions had been affected but said that the cuts weren't related to Google's proposed acquisition of the company.

The job cuts were expected to cost a total of $31 million before it would produce savings. While Motorola's losses weren't significantly worse than a year ago, they came after sales at its most important divisions fell short. The company shipped 400,000 more smartphones compared to the spring, but its Xoom shipments fell to just 100,000 units, less than half the tablets it managed in its launch quarter.

Motorola has been losing market share for the last two years. Recently it was bought by Google, mostly for its patents, but partly to give it a hardware arm of its own.